“He may have cast a spell on Little Bo’s innocent heart, but even she couldn’t deny how dangerous he was. She warned me about him just as many times as she confessed her undying love. She betrayed him because Little Bo was protecting someone else she loved,” Hagetta explained. “Little Bo and the Masked Man had a child.”
Both the twins shook their heads in disbelief. “Little Bo is a mother?” Conner asked.
“She was,” Hagetta said. “Little Bo was terrified of what the Masked Man would do if he found out she was carrying his child. He was so obsessed with power she was afraid he would see an heir as a threat. So she wrote an anonymous letter to the Fairy Palace warning them of his plans to steal from the Fairy Godmother, and he was caught in the act. Little Bo gave birth to a son while he was locked up and he never knew about the baby or the betrayal.”
“What happened to the baby?” Alex asked.
Hagetta sighed and shook her head. “Little Bo came here while she was in labor and delivered the child right in this room,” she said. “She begged me to take the child somewhere the Masked Man could never find him. She was so young at the time I couldn’t argue that the child should be raised by someone else. So I took him to a place I will never reveal for as long as I live, so his father will never find him. It broke Little Bo’s heart to be separated from the child and the Masked Man. I tried soothing her with the healing flame, but even the flames of an albino dragon can’t fix a broken heart.”
“Did you do anything else to help her?” Conner asked.
“I did,” Hagetta said. “And it was the only time I ever performed dark magic. I followed a spell I saw my sister perform on a lovesick maiden a long time ago. I cut out a small piece of Little Bo’s heart, the part that was full of hurt and longing for the men in her life, and I turned it into stone. The maiden my sister used the enchantment on turned into a soulless monster, and I wanted better for Little Bo, so I gave Little Bo the piece of her heart on a chain and told her to wear it when she was ready to face the loss that comes with love. For her sake, I hope he stays in prison for the rest of his life.”
It was a tragic story and it made Alex even more nervous about the chapter of the story they were still in.
“Hagetta, the Masked Man was recruited by the Grande Armée,” Alex said. “He promised the general he could take them to a dragon egg. We were told it was impossible, but if he is as powerful as you say, do you think he actually knows where to obtain one?”
Hagetta went very quiet and her face became still. Horrific images flashed behind her eyes that she didn’t share with the twins.
“I pray he doesn’t,” Hagetta said. “The fairies were successful in ridding the world of dragons, but there have always been rumors that there were one or two eggs left behind. No one would know how to kill a dragon anymore if one should arise—all those fairies are either dead or too old to slay a dragon now. If the Masked Man were to get his hands on a dragon egg, it wouldn’t matter what kind of plan you formed, the world would be over.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
FEEDING THE CREATURE
The villagers dug so deep into the earth they created a canyon beside the Grande Armée’s camp. A villager by the name of Farmer Robins had the misfortune of being the first to uncover the magma below the dirt. As soon as his shovel broke the ground, the lava gushed out and burned his hands. He screamed and fell to the ground in agony.
Although Rook had been warned to leave the south of the Eastern Kingdom, by the time he convinced his father that they should take Alex’s advice, the Grande Armée had occupied their farm and the villages nearby. Rook and his father were taken captive and brought to the camp to dig along with the other imprisoned villagers.
“Father!” Rook cried, and rushed to his father’s side.
Lava rapidly filled the canyon and the villagers frantically climbed out of it to safety. Rook and another man hoisted Farmer Robins onto their shoulders and helped him up out of the canyon just as its base filled with lava. The lava was so hot the abandoned shovels caught on fire before it even touched them.
General Marquis peered through his tent at the commotion and a small smile appeared on his face. He knew it was time to hatch the dragon egg.
The villagers were gathered in a group at the side of the canyon by the soldiers who observed them. They panted and sweated profusely from their quick climb. Rook held his father’s head in his lap; he was moaning in pain from his burns. He needed help but as Rook looked around the camp he realized there was no one there who could help his father. He had to figure out a way to escape the camp as soon as possible.
A few moments later General Marquis and Colonel Baton stood over the edge of the canyon looking down at the orange lava at the very bottom. The Masked Man was sent into the canyon to place the dragon egg in the lava and the commanders waited impatiently for him to return. Finally, they saw his covered face appear as the Masked Man crawled up the canyon wall.
“Oh boy, we’ve got a lively one!” he happily shouted up at the commanders. Parts of his tattered clothing had been burned off and the edges of his mask were smoky. Apparently the hatching process hadn’t been seamless.
“Did the egg hatch?” the general asked.
“Yes, it did!” the Masked Man said. “Congratulations, General, it’s a boy! And he’s a feisty lad! He nearly scorched me to death with his first breaths alone.”
The Masked Man surfaced and reached out a hand for them to help him up but the general and the colonel didn’t offer him any assistance. He pulled himself out of the ground and onto his feet and brushed all the dirt and ash from his clothes.
“And now what do we do?” the general asked.
“We feed him,” the Masked Man said. “He’s napping in the lava right now but he’s going to be very hungry in a few minutes. The key is to keep as much food down there as possible. As soon as he runs out he’ll climb up here to hunt, and we don’t want him to do that until he’s grown. Dragons are most aggressive when they first emerge from their nests, and we want him to save that energy for when he attacks the fairies.”
The general grunted after learning he would have to wait even longer. The Masked Man continued to test his patience more than any battle ever had. “What does it eat?” the general asked.
“Meat,” the Masked Man said as if it were obvious.
The general eyed the Masked Man peculiarly, hoping this might offer a chance to finally get rid of him.
“Don’t look at me,” the Masked Man said. “I’m nothing but skin and bone—he’s going to need protein to build his strength. Besides, once he emerges, you’ll still need me to show you how to declare dominance over him.”
“Lieutenant Rembert?” General Marquis ordered.
Rembert was among the soldiers keeping watch over the villagers and stepped forward. “Yes, sir?” he asked.
“Round up all the livestock we took from the villagers and bring them to the edge of the canyon,” the general said. “Gradually push the animals into the canyon as the Masked Man instructs.”
“Yes, sir,” Rembert said. “And what do you want us to do with the villagers now?”
General Marquis snuck a menacing glance at their captives. “Keep them alive for the time being,” he said. “We may need more food for the dragon later.”
Although the villagers couldn’t hear the general, it was obvious what he was plotting with the lieutenant. They whispered frantically among themselves and the families held each other a little tighter than before. Rook looked around the camp, trying to think of something—anything—to save his father and the other villagers from this nightmare.
A repetitive and turbulent vibration moved through the ground as a galloping horse traveled toward the camp. The soldiers and the villagers looked into the forest and saw Capitaine De Lange charging toward them on his horse, returning from battle. He was in a frenzy and covered a wounded arm. He jumped off his horse and ran up to General Marquis.
“General Marquis! General Marquis!” the captain cried.
The general was anything but pleased to see him. “Why are you not leading the battalion in the Charming Kingdom, Capitaine De Lange? Have you led your men to a victory already?”
De Lange fell to his knees and stared up beseechingly at him. “Sir, my battalion did everything we could, but we were outnumbered!” he told him.
“WHAT?” the general shouted.
“Outnumbered?” Baton shouted as well. “But that is impossible! We sent more than enough trolls and soldiers into the Charming Kingdom!”
Capitaine De Lange began sobbing at the general’s feet. He knew what the failure would cost him. “We counted the army correctly, sir! But we weren’t expecting that hundreds and hundreds of citizens would be fighting with them! The trolls surrendered or fled into the Dwarf Forests upon seeing them. We were defeated!”
The general took a step closer and stared into De Lange’s eyes. The lava at the bottom of the canyon behind him was nothing compared to the fire in Marquis’s eyes.
“Are you telling me our Armée was defeated by the peasant men and women of the Charming Kingdom?” General Marquis asked. His nostrils had never been so wide and his head was so red he looked like he was about to catch on fire himself.
Capitaine De Lange shook his head; he had much worse news to tell him. “Not just in the Charming Kingdom, sir! Civilians stood with their kingdom’s armies in all of the kingdoms. All of our calculations and predictions were correct—but we never could have seen this coming! Please believe me when I say we did everything in our power!”
The general turned his fiery gaze toward Colonel Baton, who was shocked by the news. “General, I oversaw the plans myself,” Baton said. “We were positive they would lead to victory.”
The general looked away from the colonel and promptly walked away from the men who had failed him. He had never been so disappointed in his entire military career.
“Lieutenant Rembert, your pistol,” General Marquis demanded.
The lieutenant followed his instructions and retrieved his pistol for the general. In the blink of an eye, General Marquis turned to Colonel Baton and Capitaine De Lange and shot them both in the foot. They fell backward and slid down the canyon walls. They moaned as they tried to get to their feet. A low growling noise vibrated up the canyon walls and the commanders’ moaning increased. A series of deafening screeches echoed next from the canyon, but they weren’t human. The sound was like a thousand nails were being dragged across metal.
“The dragon’s awake!” the Masked Man said, and the entire camp covered their ears.
In between the earsplitting screeches, the camp heard the colonel and the captain scream as they were eaten alive. The general’s wrathful stare never left his face.
Marquis handed Rembert back his pistol. “Congratulations, Rembert, you’re a colonel now,” he said. “Now feed those animals to the dragon once it’s finished with its appetizer.”
“Yes, sir,” Rembert said, and ran off to fetch the stolen livestock.
General Marquis paced up and down the edge of the canyon. He was experiencing the greatest failure of his life—and the general did not take failure well. More than half of his army was gone and it had been defeated by peasants of all things. He quietly plotted how his army was going to come back from this catastrophe.
The Masked Man approached him but kept his distance. “You started this war and you can still win it,” he said. “I’ll tell you again, once you have the dragon—”
“If you tell me one more time all I need is a dragon to win this war, I will feed you piece by piece to the dragon myself!” the general warned. “Any hunter knows you cannot kill a boar with one arrow alone. You need one for the head and one for the heart. The dragon may be an arrow I’ll fire into the head of this world, but if I had seized the capitals and the rulers of the kingdoms, I would have had this world’s heart. This army would have been unstoppable.”
Rook had been intently listening to their conversation the entire time. He realized he had information that the general wanted. “General!” he declared, standing with his hand raised. “If it’s the kings and queens you’re after, I know how you can get to them.”